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Originally Posted by Deltona Couple
YAHOOOOO!!! Another thread where I actually have experience in the area! I was in the Marine Corps for 8 years, and helped out on the drive, and the distribution. The process is simplified where you bring an UNWRAPED toy, it can be gender specific, or not, doesn't matter. Next step, we go thru the toys to make sure there is no religious content...this includes Bibles of any religion, or toys oriented towards religion. Next they are sorted by gender, or non-gender, and by age groups(we bring toys to any age child) After this is done, they are then wrapped by one of the local charities, with a tag stating gender and age group. The distribution centers are either ran by the Marines, or a local charity group, who then distributes anywhere from 3 to 5 toys per child in some cases, depending on apparent demand, and how well the drive did. So the parents have no idea what the gifts are either, since they are already wrapped.
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Awesome, thanks for the insight Deltona. Good to hear from a first-hand experience. That makes more sense now.
One question, are these drives just for Christmas or is it ongoing? If so, do they remove any reference to Christmas, or Santa so as not to offend anyone? I think they started doing this at schools too (EX: Holiday Drive instead of Christmas).
In my experience, the staffers always wore Santa hats (for a Christmas toy drive that is).
In the end though, I think it's the spirit of giving that's important here instead of the silly PCness.